McDermott has to go. I’ve had enough of his endless poor decision making. We have got steadily worse under his command. Yes, we are Champions, but our rugby is awful, which also includes last year’s Grand Final. Here’s what he has/does wrong...

- Started with Sinfield and McGuire. When he moved Sinfield to stand off we lost a playmaker with Burrow moved to the bench. McGuire one man in at scrum-half made it harder for him to support the offload, which was one of his strongest assets.

- Our rugby is terrible. There is no structure in our attack and, a lot of time, in our defence. One out rugby for 60 mins against Cas is not going to work.

- Joel Moon is not a stand-off but a great centre. Myler has structure but if Moon takes the ball from one side of the pitch to the other it ruins any set plays Myler may have planned. We, again have lost a playmaker by moving Moon away from the centres and no room for Lilley.

- Our kicking game is awful. Moon just kicks it as high as possible on the last or drills it in to touch...even if we are losing!

- Our wingers don’t score tries anymore. Neither have ever practiced the art of the spectacular dive which is a highly effective asset in the modern game.

- Cuthbertson and Parcell are getting gradually worse under McDermott. Where is the previously great offload game?

- Our forwards are flogged. JJB plays 80mins every week despite being physically tired. No wonder he is out injured now. Similar to Ablett; he could still be effective in short stints.

- Keinhorst’s Leeds career will be over at the end of the season despite his potential in the 2nd row.

- I don’t even need to mention his substitutions. Well, maybe one bit. Poor Brad Dwyer. He got more game time at Warrington.

Rant over!!

The more I have seen and heard McDermott speak over the years, the more respect I have for him as a person. I can't think of anyone I'd rather be in the trenches with. However we are not it the trenches and we need to play a more attractive brand of rugby to fill the stadium when it's completed.

I like the bloke, but I don't think he's the right man to take us forward.

I'm all for him going. Never been his biggest fan for the style of rugby we play, but you won't find a better coach at preparing his team for a final, and that's across all sports. The question is, who do we bring in? Who would be in the frame?

I find it hard to take this seriously. Sinfield had been playing stand off for years before McDermott. Smith played him there in the 2004 GF FFS! How much would we have won if we hadn't persisted with this ridiculous decision?

I agree with someone else who said they're fine with us not winning anything this season. We won what was probably an unexpected title last year with the Golden Generation running on fumes, so this was always going to be tough. We've had a fair few injuries as well and BM has an ever ageing squad with very few forwards at their peak. Any coach would struggle with that.

I'm still not convinced that BM is the right coach to rebuild the side moving forward, at least without getting a good technical coach in to rejuvenate the way we play. IMO our "unstructured" style is increasingly ineffective and also to be frank boring to watch.

I recall Powell doing similar for Sinfield in certain games in 2003.

Not much on this site makes me laugh anymore but this did.

The more years that pass the more I have come to the conclusion that McD has done at least as well as anyone would have done and probably far better. We criticize the lack of structure in the team, the individual failings of players etc. But still we won stuff, lots of stuff. Other teams are no better - not consistently anyway - they all have better patches but then so have we.
The game has changed. It's not one team, it's all of them. Defences are stifling and attack is unimaginative and based on pressure, field position and scoring from 5 metres out. This is the environment we now watch RL in. It's why Cuthbertson in his first season was a spectacular breath of fresh air.
I'd say we get crap rugby to watch because the sport is full of players who are extremely limited in capability. It's like watching A team rugby from the 80's. Any coach can only do so much with so little.
Who can blame McD hanging on to some great players when there is so little to replace them with.

Is it time for him to go? Who knows. I don't.

8 years in charge at the rhinos.

Actually DHM, I'd say if defences were up to scratch like the NRL then within 10m would be the hardest to score from.

I think the sport as a whole is suffering from too much focus on size and strength, and whilst in terms of the physics of passing most players are far better than they were twenty years ago, in terms of understanding what they are trying to do most are far worse. Its almost impossible for even the fastest runner to score long distance tries because so many players are quick, and they're fit enough to get back in cover. The sport also generally punishes teams that take risks - kicking early, Stevo's beloved chip over the top, speculative passes etc just generally give away possession in bad positions.

I look at a lot of NRL games and the highest reward generally goes to those teams that don't make mistakes, play for field position and pressure the other team into mistakes. There is almost literally no way the likes of Jason Robinson or Martin Offiah would even get a gig in the NRL. Andy Gregory would get smashed off the pitch crabbing across the field. Even a Hanley would struggles as he'd be way too small for the pack. That's just English players, and there are plenty of Aussie equivalents.

IMO the sport as a whole needs to take a long hard look at entertainment. I'd cut interchanges right back, and look at any means necessary for reducing stoppages, as IMO they're what enable these monstrous athletes to completely dominate the game. When did the rules change such that an injured player nowhere near play stopped the game? Why so long to form a scrum or have a discussion with captains about every penalty? If the defence takes ages to pack a scrum, allow a quick tap and sinbin anyone who should be in the scrum who makes a tackle. Whilst we're at it why not just play decent advantage like in RU - the advantage lasts until it has obviously gone. Etc etc.

Good post Brisbane, i would add the age of time it takes to keep looking over VR decisions especially in SL.

Honestly don't see too much that can be done but i would love a complete clean up of the ruck and the wrestle that would go a long way to speeding the game up and helping the general flow.

Personally I think that is very short sighted. Technically it is wholly correct, but in the bigger picture it is wrong. Where are we as a club from when he came in to where he is now? we are massively backwards. Yes we have won things, but that has been at the sacrifice of everything we built on to win those things in the first place, something that he has a coach can not deal with the way previous ones have. We now have to start again to repeat it, and that won't start with him at the helm.

In terms of your other point on standard, again you are correct here. But again I put this down to the likes of McDermott and the other British coaches that do not have the standard in them to coach to the levels we used to have. It isn't that the standard of player that has dried up, its just simply they are never delveoped like they were due to the coaches at the top at clubs.

Is there a correlation between the number of ex-forward coaches - Wane, McD, Radford, Cunningham, Betts, McN - & the dour RL they coach, against the more entertaining, but not necessarily successful, brand coached by ex-HBs like Powell & Holbrook?

Interesting point, am now trying to remember the coaches of yesteryears great teams.

Doug Laughton was a great forward and his teams played entertaining stuff.

I thought about the older coaches - Noble being another very successful ex forward - but concluded they had exemplary players in a time of poorer defence coaching & conditioning. They is a dearth of the players like Offiah, Davies, Sorenson, Tait, Devereux, Myler, Pauls, Vaikona, Vainikolo, Withers, Peacock, Lowes; who would be superstars today.
Both Laughton & Noble have failed to replicate their successes at clubs with less talent at their disposal.

Yes, the size and strength aspect is the same in union. I know a lad who got into Bath's under 16's based almost entirely on his shoe size - I am being serious. My son had his size stats recorded by Gloucester at 14 and they wanted mine and his Mum's height as well.
Don't know about the passing. I don't think things have progressed significantly for decades in that department in League - other than the balls are covered in glue these days. Even I looked like Wally Lewis with a new ball in my hands (fat and bearded). I am surprised that there isn't a pocket now sewn into shirts for sticking the ball up.
But I do agree that the main drive has been physical power and keeping the error count as low as possible. Add to that 4 subs and multiple interchanges and you get what you get. No space, no willingness to take risks to create it and lots and lots of brute force.

I think for those of us who have grown up watching in the 70’s and 80’s the game now is largely boring. As athletes have got got bigger and faster, the space has got less and less which has cut down the ability to be creative along with a push towards an NRL style percentages game.

If the game truly wanted to progress it would introduce measures to recreate the space and skill that we so rarely see these days.

Or perhaps I’m just getting old...

no I agree.its like men who star in porn films.



it's all about size.......

Its not as easy as you think

but someone has to do it

grass is easier on the knees though..........

Those were the days - reseeding!!

There's not even any biff